Kyoto has well over a thousand temples, and a single day will show you six at most. This plan takes the southern shrine first thing, walks the old lanes of Higashiyama through the middle of the day, and crosses the city once in the afternoon for the Golden Pavilion. Total travel time is roughly an hour across four short hops.
Is one day in Kyoto worth it?
One day is enough to understand Kyoto and not nearly enough to see it. The day below is a fair account of the city: a mountain shrine, a hillside temple, preserved streets, a market and a gilded pavilion on a pond.
Two groups should not attempt it. If you have come for the gardens, Ryōan-ji, Saihō-ji, the Katsura villa, you need two days and some need writing to in advance. If you are with young children, or anyone who tires on stairs, cut the day in half: Fushimi Inari alone involves a great many steps. Our method is in how to plan a day trip.
Getting around
Kyoto is a bus city with two subway lines. An IC card, Suica, Pasmo or ICOCA, covers the buses, the subway, JR and the Keihan and Hankyu lines.
Kyoto Station to Fushimi Inari is two stops on the JR Nara Line to Inari station, about five minutes, with the shrine gate directly outside. From there to Kiyomizu-dera, the Keihan line north to Kiyomizu-Gojō and a steady uphill walk is usually quicker than going back through Kyoto Station. Gion to Kinkaku-ji is a city bus from Shijō Kawaramachi, or the Karasuma subway north and a short bus, and takes roughly forty minutes. Coming back down to Nishiki Market afterwards takes about the same.
To extend the day into Nara, JR rapid services from Kyoto Station take around forty-five minutes, and Kintetsu limited express trains around thirty-five to a station beside Nara Park.
The day, hour by hour
08:00 Fushimi Inari Taisha. The head shrine of thousands of Inari shrines across Japan, dedicated to the deity of rice, harvest and business. The tunnels of vermilion torii climbing Mount Inari are what most people come for, each gate paid for by a company or family whose name is painted on the back. Walk at least to the Yotsutsuji junction, about half an hour up, where the crowds thin and the city appears below you.
10:00 Kiyomizu-dera. A temple on the eastern hillside whose main hall is built out over the slope on a wooden platform assembled without nails. The view back over Kyoto from the stage is the postcard, but the walk down to the Otowa waterfall, where visitors drink from three streams using long-handled cups, is what people remember. The main hall is ticketed.
11:30 Sannenzaka. The stepped lanes falling away from Kiyomizu-dera, Sannenzaka and Ninenzaka, are preserved streets of wooden machiya houses now filled with tea shops, ceramics and pickle sellers. Look up at the rooflines rather than at the queue for the photogenic corner. Lunch here, or in the quieter streets just off it.
12:30 Yasaka Shrine. At the bottom of the hill, where Higashiyama meets Gion, sits the shrine that has anchored the Gion Matsuri festival for over a thousand years. The courtyard of paper lanterns bearing the names of local businesses is worth the detour, and you can walk straight through into Maruyama Park. Entry is free.
13:30 Gion. The old entertainment district runs west from the shrine along Shijō. Hanamikōji is the famous lane of wooden teahouses; Shirakawa, a block north along a willow-lined canal, is prettier and calmer. Photography is restricted on some private lanes, and geiko and maiko going to work are not a spectacle, so keep the camera down.
15:00 Kinkaku-ji. The Golden Pavilion, a Zen temple of the Shōkoku-ji school, has its top two storeys covered in gold leaf and reflected in the pond before it. The route is one-way and takes about half an hour. It comes before the market rather than after it, because the grounds close in the late afternoon and a later arrival turns this into a rush. Check the closing time for your date.
16:45 Nishiki Market. Five narrow covered blocks running parallel to Shijō, known as Kyoto's kitchen. This is where the city buys tsukemono pickles, yuba, tofu, dashi and knives, alongside stalls selling skewers to eat on the spot. Stalls begin shutting in the early evening, so this is the end of the shopping rather than the start. Eating while walking is discouraged, so finish what you buy at the stall.
18:30 Pontochō. Back in the centre, a single alley one person wide runs between Shijō and Sanjō beside the Kamo river, lit by lanterns and lined with restaurants. In summer many build wooden decks out over the water, called kawayuka. Some have a seating charge and a few do not take walk-ins, so read the door before you commit.
What to book ahead
Very little. Temples and shrines sell tickets at the gate and nothing here uses timed entry. The exceptions are dinner in Pontochō or Gion, where the better small restaurants take bookings weeks out, and any tea ceremony you want to build the day around.
Open this day trip in Tralendr
The route is saved as a plan, with each stop pinned on a map in walking order and the times attached. It opens in a browser without an account, so you can see the shape of the day before changing a thing.
Open the one day in Kyoto plan and edit it freely: move Kinkaku-ji into the morning, swap Nishiki for a garden, or add the temple you came for. Share the link and everyone else opens the same map on their phones.
For a second day in Kansai, the obvious one is next door: the Nara day trip from Kyoto. The rest are at all our day trips.